Word: orbits
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...engine, says Rocketdyne, would open new possibilities. Combined with appropriate secondary stages, it could put a 20,000-lb. satellite in a polar orbit 1,000 miles high. It could carry 6,200 Ibs. of payload around the moon, 2,000 Ibs. around Mars. With proper auxiliary apparatus it could land a 1,600-lb. payload gently on the moon, or a 400-lb. payload on Mars. Yoked together, four of these engines should be capable of putting man into space along with enough of his natural environment to keep him alive...
...once in four tries, this was a milk-run space delivery-but on a new route. All other U.S. satellites were launched toward the equator to take advantage of the earth's 1,000-m.p.h. spin. Explorer IV soared northeast along the New England coast, into a looping orbit which will span more of the earth's surface-including most of Russia...
...course shaving Cape Hatteras and passing just to the east of New England, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. The earlier Explorers, fired somewhat south of due east, never came farther north than the latitude of Atlanta, but Explorer IV reaches 51° north. As the earth turns inside its orbit, it will pass over most of western Europe, southern Russia (but not Moscow), all of the U.S. and Japan, most of China, all of the tropics and most of the land in the Southern Hemisphere except Antarctica...
...northerly orbit permits Explorer IV to report more fully on cosmic rays, which vary in intensity from the poles to the equator. But the satellite got less launching throw (205 m.p.h. less than Explorer III) from the west-to-east turning of the earth...
...thrust of this system would be extremely low, but it would use little material. Ten Ibs. of thrust working for 1.5 years would speed a 50-ton spaceship to 135,000 m.p.h. At the end of this time it would have covered one billion miles, or beyond the orbit of Saturn...